Shattered Portrait
by twindragonsx1
Summary: Princess Celestia's thoughts after an attack on Equestria by an unknown force, leaving it burning and destroyed, while also leaving behind tears of time long gone and forgotten by all...


**(A/N: Hi, everybody/everypony! This is Devin, and I'm here with another fanfic. However, this will just be a one-shot.**

**I've always liked Celestia, and how she keeps her secrets and plays small pranks on others. So, I decided to write this here one-shot (albeit being a sad one). I got inspiration to write this when I was listening to Coldplay's Viva La Vida. I know what you're thinking, that this is a cliché thing to do, but I promise that this will be good. And if it doesn't appeal to you, then I'm sorry.**

**If anyone could tell me what that thing that Celestia wears on her chest is, that'd be great. For now, I'm calling it an amulet.**

**Reviews would be appreciated, and flames will be used to roast marshmallows, steak, and other foods.)**

_**Shattered Portrait**_

Princess Celestia slowly walked around the ruins of what was once the grand city of Canterlot, and all of its golden spires.

Well, what was once Canterlot, anyways.

The former Princess stayed at the side of the road, making her way towards the ominous form of Canterlot Castle. Weaving around a fallen roof, she continued along, gingerly stepping over rubble and debris.

And not five minutes later, she came across a pony's body. It only served as a reminder of her biggest failure. Celestia cautiously stepped up to the body, and levitated it up into the air. Using a blast of magic, she dug a hole in the ground and carefully laid the corpse in the hole. She then lifted the dirt into the air and piled it onto the body. She gently stamped on the dirt to smooth it out.

Wordlessly, the princess moved on. She pondered what she had done wrong. It wasn't that she had been a terrible leader, or that her subjects had failed her.

It was that there was simply no way to fight them all.

Celestia looked up at the once majestic Canterlot skyline, eyeing the destroyed spires and craters pock marking the landscape. The starry night skies did nothing to improve her mood. She still felt the aura of death and decay around her, and it had only happened about a week ago.

_"What day is it today…" _she wondered. After a minute of thinking, she assumed that it was a Monday.

Today was the day that she was supposed to visit her famous student Twilight Sparkle in Ponyville.

The thought of her beloved student and her friends brought tears to her eyes, but she wiped them away. She had mourned too much already, she thought to herself.

Shaking her head, Celestia looked up to find herself at the castle ruins. She crossed the lowered drawbridge into the deep, dark depths of the castle.

She wandered through hallways of darkness that seemed to swallow everything, only lit by her magic. Though servants' quarters and Royal Guard posts she traveled, finding nothing but more bodies and a feeling of overwhelming despair and anguish.

Celestia finally came across the one place that she had been to many, many times over the course of her immortal lifetime: her royal throne room.

Meager amounts of light filtered into the room through holes in the ceiling, and statues were overturned. The magnificent chandelier that once hung on the ceiling had crashed to the floor, spreading glass shards everywhere.

And the regal throne, from which Celestia herself was thrown from, was completely and utterly destroyed.

The once majestic princess slowly moved up to a statue, left unmolested by the attack, and removed her crown and amulet, giving up her position as ruler of Equestria.

"Perhaps I am no longer fit to rule…" she murmured.

The grandiose alicorn looked up through one of the holes in the ceiling.

"Please, by Mother Faust above, I beg for forgiveness," she whispered, "and nothing more than to have another chance to right my wrongs."

But deep down, she knew that she could not be forgiven, and that her wish for another chance could simply not happen.

A single tear rolled down her eye as she spread her dirtied wings and took off, gliding though the very same hole that she once stared out of.

Flying above the once-splendid throne room, Celestia flew to the tallest tower in the castle, and flew in through another hole in the ceiling. The alicorn landed with a soft thump on the cold, hard floor of her former bedroom.

She closed her eyes upon seeing the last thing she would ever want to see right then: the last letter she would ever receive from Twilight.

Turning around and bowing her head, Celestia grimaced at the thought of the content in the letter. She opened her eyes once again to see a photo.

The frame and the glass that covered it were broken and shattered. But this photo was no ordinary photo.

This was a photo of Twilight and her friends, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Applejack. They were all smiling and laughing in a beautiful grassy field.

Tears collected in the once-grandiose princess' eyes as she looked at the broken portrait, and her legs trembled. And finally, former Princess Celestia was broken.

Shivers wracked Celestia's frame as she wept, openly and bitterly. She sank to her knees, sobbing, soaking the photo with teardrops.

"This…" she started, "this… is my fault. I failed to lead my subjects. I… I was meant to lead them to a better life, but… instead, I lead them to their deaths…"

"And such a simple mistake… a _**simple mistake**_… lead to the loss of all of my subjects, and the ones that matter to me the most…"

Celestia laid there for a good ten minutes before the tears stopped flowing down her muzzle. Then, she stood up, spread her wings once more, and took off once more, sailing into the starry night sky.

And the only things left in her wake were tears of a time long gone and forgotten by all.

**(A/N: Well, there you have it. This really wasn't meant to be a tear-jerker, or a story to rip out your heartstrings, just a little story for you all to read.**

**Eventually, I may make this one-shot longer, so keep tabs on this story.**

**As for the unseen force that had ruined all of Equestria… well, I'd rather not reveal it, and I'll just let you readers decide just what it was for yourselves.**

**After all, some questions are better left unanswered…)**


End file.
